Dan Cameron's Prospect 1 art event has the potential for greatness

I want it to work. I want Dan Cameron's dream of an international art exhibit to be such a success that it eventually becomes the art-world equivalent of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, with tens of thousands of visitors streaming into the city to tour scores of cutting-edge exhibits scattered around town.

But I'm apprehensive.

Like Jazzfest, Prospect 1, which will feature 81 international and regional artists at 17 sites throughout New Orleans, requires virtually no new infrastructure. The exhibits will be installed in existing museums and spaces. Essentially, it will be a hospitality event, something New Orleans does well.

The event is scheduled to start on Halloween. That's frighteningly close. In a conversation last week, Cameron seemed confident about the looming deadline, but said that he had raised only $1.8 million of the projected $2.9 million needed.

ELLIS LUCIA / TIMES-PICAYUNE

Cameron, who splits his time between New York City and his new digs in Treme, said Prospect 1 has five New Orleans-based employees handling the details of presenting the event. He predicts that several "impromptu guerrilla shows" will spring up, transforming this city into an "art-crazy town, a place with more art in it than it knows what to do with."

He reports that PictureBox, a Brooklyn publisher, has agreed to cover the printing costs of the 450-page Prospect 1 catalog that will include essays by Cameron and Times-Picayune columnist Lolis Eric Elie, among others.

Cameron brings credibility to the project. For a decade, he was the chief curator of the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York. In May 2007, he became visual arts director of the Contemporary Arts Center on Camp Street. For many of us, his move to the Crescent City was one of the most promising events of the post-flood art scene.

His CAC debut exhibit in February, however, was a political misstep. Most Crescent City artists welcomed a curator with Cameron's clout, but many feared they would fly beneath his radar. His first show seemed to confirm those fears. "Something From Nothing" featured 14 international artists who were invited to come to recovery-era New Orleans and create art without conventional materials or studios -- something that had become a way of life for many New Orleans artists. He would have done himself a favor by first showing his loyalty to the hometown artists who have struggled to stay.

Of the 81 artists scheduled to show during Prospect 1, only 11 are from Louisiana, but this event always was intended to be an international exposition, an American version of shows such as the Venice Biennale. In 2007, the sprawling, century-old Venice show drew more than 300,000 visitors to the inundated tourist town to see exhibits from places as far-flung as Korea, Brazil and Finland.

Those Crescent City artists who are angry about being left out should remember that the thousands of art lovers lured to New Orleans by Prospect 1 will certainly discover a local art scene as interesting as ours.

DOUG MACCASH / THE TIMES-PICAYUNEScreaming in Murano

They'd discover it even if it wasn't so interesting, for that matter. While in Venice for the 2007 Biennale, I discovered the island of Murano, the capital of Venetian glass-making, which had nothing to do with the international art exhibition. In fact, it had nothing to do with art. The best thing I saw on my brief visit (about 90 minutes, though it seemed longer) to that island of endless kitsch was a glass version of Munch's screaming man. I knew exactly how he felt.

If Prospect 1 succeeds, it will be a plus for all of New Orleans.

But will it succeed? Cameron pointed out that Prospect 1 had only begun raising money in August. He said he had made requests for between $6 million and $7 million to potential patrons, and his "batting average" has been one dollar received for every three requested. He expects more money to come in this summer, and to close the gap the night of the $1,000-per-head Halloween gala.